Stories from Indian Railways

This is not the story of Indian Railway-certainly not about it, when it started and how it started. Here, I have tried to put down our own general experiences associated with Indian railways.

Let me begin the story with the word 'railway' itself. When a common nepali public talks about railway, we hear that there is a railway in Janakpur Nepal which joins Jayanagar, Bihar in India. This is the story which I have also heard it often in my life.
I have never seen Nepalese railway- and frankly, I am not sure whether that is true or not. But if hearsay is to be believed, this railway moves in a snail pace, will be always crowded and there is no need of paying fair because no one pays.That is the story of Neapalese Railway. Now, today, here, I am going to talk about Indian Railways.

To see Indian railway, you have to come to India. Of Course as there is no train link between India and Nepal unlike India-Pakistan. Nepal and India are such a close friends and there is vast areas where they can share resorces and relationship but lack of infrastructure in Nepal and India's apathy, I think that is what, makes nepal less travelled/untravelled areas for Indian Railways.

For a common man, a big snake like crawling, long, blue coloured railways first look a different creature. Many many coaches, connected with an Engine and travelling in every possible plain areas in India makes life easier for people in India. May be gift of british India, to say that for its own sake, but today, Indian railway plays a very great role in transportation in India. Normal railways look blue in colour, some special Rajdhani Express-red, cargo train brick like colour, petroleum tanks- green and small trains within city-green are the general distinction of railways in India.

Imagine, You try to catch a railway and you have been delayed by three minutes and train has just left on time. This is a very common story. Sometimes, people run after train when it has just started and has slowly caught its speed. It looks like a special movie scene where Shahahrukh/Ajaya/Salman or some one from that coterie runs after kajol/kareena/urmila etc. etc.

WE have to carry our bag on one hand and have to run after it.

With me and with my friends, it has happened many times. Sometimes, we looked fool but that's the part of life.

Mainly Nepalese people board Train from Gorakhpur, Patna or New Jalpaiguri. If you are a new visitor here in these cities, you have to be careful from everything- robbery, pickpocketers, train timing, platform No. etc. If you have a morning train, waking up at correct time is another issue. I know my many friends have missed their train when they got up at 7AM where as their train was scheduled at 6.30AM.

Recently, this happened with one of my friends. He had train of New Jalpaiguri at 7.30 AM and we got up at 7AM. We had so many things to carry and we rushed to station. Thankfully, we caught the train but that experience was horrifying. I personally thought that we will not be able to catch the train. When we caught the train, we shared our stories how we caught n missed the trains.

My friend who took train to NJP had many such experiences in life. While going to Kerala or in 2006 June, while coming from Delhi to Hyderabd, he had almost similar experiences. He had to run after the moving train at those times. But, this time, train was halted and had not started to move when we reached.

I also have missed my train once from Kolkatta to Hyderabad but not because of my fault. It's coz of first train got delayed and I have very horrifying experiences which I have already written elsewhere. But, these kinds of stories are common to all, who travel to India by train.

You like it or do not like it but you can not discard it.

Work sucks but I do not mind!!!!

Hey Dude!

Wat's up man?......Vineet says, a new friend. I have seen him often in the office corridor, but had never spoken with him. He speaks with me yesterday in loo. I said, Hey Man. I am good. how r u? He says, fine.........he asked me, is there work till late night? It was about six in the evening. I said not that much but one assignment is still there. And it was saturday as well which is supposed to be an off day but I was in office from morning to evening. I reciprocated him and his answer is they (He and all people in his service line-Transaction Advisory Services) treat every saturday as a working day. I understood.

So, U work in direct or indirect? "I am in Indirect tax", was my reply. So, U work with R? again another question. He was asking about my manager. I answered no, I am with BA, my manager's name.

HUh....
Okay, So, what are you? an intern or associate? His question was little demeaning n i think by my look on face and youthness, either he underestimated me/underrated me or deleberately asked this question. or May be he did not ask the question deliberately......it was just his way of asking to know about me.

I said, "I am a Consultant". Good, he said. So, When did you qualify? His intention was to ask when did i become a 'Chartered Accountant'? I said, I am a lawyer, a B.A;L.L.B (Hons.)'.

As where I work is a firm by/for CAs, most of them think that I am a CA. n now, my turn to throw him flurry of questions. n the same questions- like in which service line you work? what's ur qualification? how long u are here? how long u are here in this city? n this and that- all in Wh or yes/no question form.

He answered all, of course, as i said above, that he works in TAS and an MBA. Rest of the answers are immeterial now.

After this initial introductory session, now, questions about real work that we do. N he is there to ask another question, "How is work?"

I looked at him, and slowly stared at him, maintaining silence. He waited for my answer. and finally after a little longer pause, I answered, "It sucks."

and again a silence, n then, I add, "But, I do not mind."

hahahha.......hehehe.........laughter from both sides. R not you enjoying it? another question there.

No, absolutely not, was my staright forward answer. I look at him n he is looking at me, is in a real difficulty whether to smile or not. He is in his half smile, and I futher add his difficulty by saying " But, I am getting used to it." I flash a broad smile and he understand that it's moment to smile.

Yes, of course. All moments in life are fpor smile. We should be cheerfull all the time should be able to laugh at our failures and adversity so that stresses can be put at bay. 

Of course, smiling and cheering up life does not mean that you should not take work seriously. In fact, we should always be serious in life at work but tension and pressure because of work should not be there. Anyway, after this initial on and off of laughter and smile, he asked me general nature of work. Then, I started explaining him that I am replying a show cause notice where stakes are very high. Only the service tax demanded by government is more than 100 Carores and I gave some gyan about my kind of work. N we headed to our respective service line compartments.

He headed to west and I headed to east to be more serious in work and to get more 'used to' of it.

Habit of Reading

In my earlier blog post, I was talking about reading magazines and Newspaper. Yes, I love to read them. When I am going to finish this post another day and not on the day, I started writing it, The Hindu is before me. I guess you all know my fascination and my like of The Hindu. It is the best newspaper in India not barring its several flaws and drawbacks.

In this blog entry today, I wish to talk about my fascination of reading books. I am not that avid reader. But, I keep on reading them. Books on all subjects and if they are interesting, I love to read them. I have only one bad habit is not to complete the books once I start to read. I need to make a resolution now in life that I read a lot of and many many books and make sure that I compltete each of them. It is not the first time that I am making resolution but I need to implement them is what I think now.

Regarding books, I am reading two books simultaneously. One is Godan by Premchand in English. I knew that Premchand was a great writer in India where he wrote hindi novels and depicted the plight of poor peasants, n farmers who suffered from British rule. As I understand that Premchand's most of the stories and novels are based on the rural India's life where British Rule coupled with rich and mighty Indians exploited their own Indian brothers and sisters. N Premchand's Godan is also in that background.

I bought this book in 2008 May when I went to Delhi, Cannaught Place with one of my foreign friends. She was not from native english speaking country. So, she bought there some grammer books for children which she wanted to use while teaching primary kids in her country. I have this habit that whenever I go to any book place I bring something with me; for me. 

When I saw that ocean of books there, could not resist myself from buying the book. I took Godan. now, I kept that book for a long time and thought in last October that I should read that. I started reading in October and it's not over yet. I think it is only 51% of book that I have read.

Meanwhile, My friend varun gave me some good books. N I have started another Book now. It is by Sashi Tharoor where he writes about emerging India, where compares India as a gaint elephant and wants to make it a Lively Wild Tiger.

There is a contrast in both these books. One is about rural poverty, and mendicancy of Indian poors before government authorities in North India. Another is about dream of emerging nation as a superpower and economically sustainable. Of course, Mr. Tharoor knows the ground reality of India and makes reader concious of the fact that India owns even the many many poor people in this world and not only the 20-30 millioners in top fifty list. But, we can sense the optimism that sashi has through his writings.

Whaever!!!!

By reading two books on contrasting topics, I look forward to reading more in future....

That's all for the day!!! You guys keep on reading!!! My blog.

Reading Newspaper and Magazine

When we try tow rite something, something pulls us back. I do not know what but I have seen the people's tendency to be pulled back. Our Business, our laziness, our moodlessness, our capability not being able to write are the main factors that contribute in not writing regularly.

For example, now also, I have nothing to write. No new topic to write on blog though there are thousands of things to chirp if situation is suitable. Most of the time, we will make situation very suitable, either we change or we change the time and will be talking wither this or that. But, when there comes the issue of writing, we hardly find time so appealing. At least, I have been frequently disturbed while I start writing and blogs go unattended for days, weeks and even months sometimes.

Generally, I would like to hear from you how you develop the trend of writing continuously. What makes you to write regularly and most often. Please share your thoughts!!!!
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My favourite topic to talk and to write enough is 'About Reading'. What we are reading and what we read generally. Generally, I read News most often from Google News page. I love reading news on general politics of India and Nepal, International News Related to Law, Economics and some amounts of Politics and some kind of Analytical News from around the web. Except that News of sports and only of Cricket is another great things to read. The Hindu in India is the heavyweight website to read analytical and critical news though many people may think that it is very boring and biased paper. It may of that kind in some respect but the kind of language it employs in reporting and analysis it makes are very great in this Paper.

The other site I regularly visit is The Economist. It is another great magazine to read about News, Politics, International News and of course News on Economics and Business. It gives a very great insights of events of outside world.

Cricinfo.com is another site about only cricket. It gives live update of things about Cricket and very well written articles about various aspects of cricket. Very balanced but very trendy and well written contents in the Cricinfo make it a great website to read.

These are all generally what I read these days as I will not be getting much time. The office and tiring days have become routine life of most of the human beings and I am not the exception.
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In my next blog, What kind of books, I read and will be reading, I will talk about that.
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